Riccardo's first draft ToP

1. What have you been making?

2. How did you do it? (method)

This year I have been researching on the ways of perceiving and the ways of deploying colours and light. I did so by carrying different approaches.

In the work For Seven Time We Woke Up developed for the Eye Research Labs, I have been studying the technological staging of colours - as editable materialities in the context of software editing and software development - and their effects on perception. I started this process after founding, during a bike tour in Rotterdam organised by Leslie Robbins, Becoming Invisible, a book from Ian Whittlesea where in a meditation exercise based on breathing techniques and the imaginative synthesis of colours clouds is carried on for the esoteric purpose of becoming invisible. At the age of 11 I had a similar experience. At that time my mother was carrying on a variation of this type of meditation with the aim of healing, successfully she later said, a disease. Under her guide I experienced the exercise myself, resulting in a feeling of deep relaxation and strong physical awareness. With the idea of translating the book of Ian Whittlesea into a moving-image piece, I firstly tried to have on-screen text that gave indication on the steps to follow, but then decided to spoil the vision of any direct instruction and to gave space to the evolution of a colour choreography. Rather than giving to the audience the feeling of being following a meditation, I decided to work on my own abilities of structuring sound and colours into a time-based experience, resulting in an immersive journey that I would describe as an atmospheric narrative.

As part of this research on light and colours, this year, in the film Yellow Message I got together three shoots based on the observation of atmospheric changes. How lights changes over the course of an hour? How is it refracted when the leafs are moved by wind? How it encounters the textile of a flag upon which the shadows of branches of a nearby tree are cast? This film combines footage that I took in Sansepolcro (IT) during a period of study to learn the practice of flag waving, with recordings made in a little swamp situated in the south of Rotterdam. The three scenes that forms the movie are formally associated by the presence of the colour yellow, while the main subject is the light and its way of interacting with different materialities.

Throughout this two movies I feel to be exploring concept as opacity and transparency and how this physical dynamics of overlaying and overlapping construct images. I feel these do be metaphors of an approach oriented toward the appreciation of phenomenas that take place all round us, from site-specific locations to synthetic landscapes, from the light emitted by the sun to the one rendered by computational engines, and that suggests a strong sense of appreciation of the materialities surrounding us, and makes me able to celebrate rituals, the coming together in a place to watch and listen.

3. Relation to previous practice

Both light and sound acts in the range of a spectrum of waves, the first through electromagnetic waves the second through acoustic waves. As composer, in the past year I have been working with sounds by developing my own software and implementing digital signal processing techniques that acts as filters, reverbs and distortions. This year I developed a new sound performance (you can listen it with the mp3 Live Electronics @ Sonoscopia) where I treat sounds recordings of a french horn as if they are light waves filtered by prisms. In similar ways this year, especially with For Seven Times We Woke Up, I have been working with light as I would with sound, through filters that alters the perception of an original image. (maybe expand more?) For me it has been particularly challenging the creation of a system to generate this video. This system involves both generative parameters (the movement of the spheres is generated by mathematical functions that distributes partially-random values) and precise automations written as a score to be followed. The combination of these aspects had to be recorded in high quality, and so I developed my own code to synchronise generative parameters and written automation to compute the frame and exporting it in non-real time: each frame takes several minutes to be computed, and when computed, the system goes on computing the following one. This is a workflow that I am developing since two years, and during the creation of this movie I reached a good stage of development that gives me a good base for further use and development.

(connection with dance and theater, and the movement toward narration? Add reference to seminars!) Inspired by practices as dance and music I am interest in the movements between postures, and the pace with which these changes are carried: sometimes this lead to animated movies, others to virtual photographies.

4. What do you want to make next?

5. Why do you want to make it?

I want to continue a previous work, ‘Enter the ♥’, about the “Pentolaccia” tradition, mostly known as Piñata, to talk about the story we hear so many times: there is something to gain by excavating value. The Pentolaccia is a container filled with treats that is broken as part of a celebration that occurs in different cultures for different occasions. The essence is that of celebrating abundance. Three years ago I was watching my brother playing a video game wherein one of the main aim is that of building up the power of your avatar by finding rare items that he can wear, from weapons to amors and gems. The boss fights (fights against particularly strong characters) would resemble the ‘Pentolaccia’ celebration, as the body of the slain opponent, often monstrous, would spill coins and precious artefacts as much as graphic blood: treasures and treats all around, labeled with color codes that highlights the rarity of these items. I am in the process of thinking how to approach this topic, without addressing video games as necessarily bad, but relating with our dreams of being heroes, making great deeds, slaying monsters, and wanting to suggest another approach: no need to break the jar, because it is beautiful, better to look at it. I imagine the first half of this work to be revolving around the relation between a mother watching her kid playing videogames (see the script in the text folder for further explanations) and the second half being an audiovisual experience based on color and sounds (see the video for a reference of how it looks and sound like). I imagine a work that is sad, serene, meaningful, boring and cathartic. I want to speak about our use of simulation engines and challenge the use we make out of them.

6. Relation to a larger context

7. References

This section has to become less of a list and more of a larger context

The light rooms of Dan Flavin, the discs of Robert Irwin, the Skyspaces of James Turrell and the Ganzfeld, are inspiring me to explore interactions between light and architecture, if not digital architectures and natural landscapes (rendering engines vs the sun). Filmmaker and visual artist Pipilotti Rist says that one of the main subjects in her works is self-censorship. In the movie ‘Pepperminta’ the main character deploys the power of colour as an antidote to awake emotional intelligence, boost the immune system and overcoming one’s fear. I find her work a strong inspiration for the playfulness and irreverence of her approach. Composer and sculptor Charlemagne Palestine with his drone music and puppets, microtonal music. Phil Niblock with his sampling rudimental techniques. James Benning with his slow cinema. Samsara by Lois Patiño, engagement with local cultures, slow tempo that opens imagination, A\V meditations. Zone of interest by Jonathan Glazer for the use of sound and the relation between foreground and background. Lolo & Sosaku by Sergio Caballero, for the hacking of the western gender, the border crossing between fiction and documentation, the performativity of the actors.